Year’s first Great Indian Bustard chick is born!

With hatching at the Sam Conservation Breeding Centre, Jaisalmer, forest wildlife officials upbeat about success of conservation efforts

The captive breeding programme for the critically endangered great indian bustard in Rajasthan has seen a big success with the first captive-bred great indian bustard chick (GIB), of 2024 being hatched at the Sam Conservation Breeding Centre (CBC). Rajasthan Forest Department tweeted, “Rajasthan Forest Department (RFD), Wildlife Institute of India (WII), and Ministry of Environment, Forest, and Climate Change (MoEFCC) celebrate a monumental success in Jaisalmer: the first captive-bred great indian bustard chick of 2024 has hatched at the Sam CBC!”

The forest department also stated that this landmark achievement heralds a new dawn for the conservation of this critically endangered species. It may be noted that this is the first captive bred GIB chick of this year. Two conservation breeding centres (CBCs) for great indian bustard are located in Sam and Ramdevra. The Sam centre established in 2019 houses 16 GIB and the Ramdevra Centre operationalised in 2022 houses 13 GIB. One male and seven female GIB in Sam centre are showing signs of sexual maturity.

All birds in Ramdevra centre are less than two years old (juveniles). Year 2023 recorded successful breeding of two females with the single breeding male in Sam. In 2024, this male had started displaying breeding signs from the month of February. The first successful breeding attempt happened on March 6, between Leo (male) and Toni (female). The female laid an egg after this breeding on the night of March 11. The egg was collected the next morning after the female stopped incubating and was put in the artificial incubator. The chick successfully hatched after 22 days of artificial incubation. The chick is healthy and is being hand-reared and closely monitored in Sam centre. This marks the initiation of captive breeding of GIB for the current year and the third captive produced chick of this species.
 
“We expect some of the other mature females to breed this year as well. The single breeding male is four years old and has bred naturally with females. We wish to continue the same practice with this male and have started training the younger males (1-2 years age) on dummy females for assisted reproduction. The younger males (1-2 years age) have not reached sexual maturity yet, so we expect semen collection from these males after about one to two years, that will help in captive breeding through artificial insemination techniques for this species,” a press release by WII stated.

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No of chicks hatched in captive breeding till now

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